Fitness Expert’s Tip of the Month – December

This time of year may be challenging to stick with your eating and workout plan, but know that it is possible to stay healthy, fit and feel great throughout the holiday season.
Everyone indulges now and again and that is ok. Know that eating more than you should for one meal doesn’t mean that every meal needs to be that rich, or that large. It’s also good for you to miss a workout now and again, but know that missing 1 is ok and missing weeks at a time is not ok. Creating stable patterns is important no matter how old you are, or what your fitness goals are.

Remember that when it comes to burning off the extra piece of apple pie, or rich lasagna meal you’ll have to up your level of intensity during your workouts and increase your heart rate for at least 30 minutes at a time to keep your body healthy and in check.

Burning Off the Calories You Eat
It is difficult to calculate how much activity it takes to burn off calories from a certain food, but it is possible to come up with estimations of calories burned during exercise. Calories burned during activity depend on the size, metabolism and physical condition of the individual as well as the intensity of the activity. For example someone weighing 130lbs may burn about 300 calories in a 60 minute hi energy dance fitness class while someone weighing 150lbs may burn about 400 calories.

Are walking and running good ways to burn calories?
YES! You can burn fat and calories by either walking or running. In general, how much depends on how far you go, and running the same distance takes less time than walking. Still, if you prefer to walk, do that and just go for a longer time. To get much weight loss, you should walk or run at least three miles most days. You can get better results by combining your exercise with a little calorie reduction. Cutting out some junk food like a soda, or doughnut every day works great. You don’t have to do your walking all at once. You can do 20 minutes or so twice a day and that counts just as much. Just remember when it comes to this time of year, creating consistency is important to maintaining good health.

Other tips for staying healthy all year long.

1. Your body is over 70% water. You should be drinking at least ½ your body weight in water each day. To add some pizzazz to plain filtered water, try adding some lemon; lime; cucumber; or mandarin oranges.
2. Make sure that when eating a meal most of your plate is filled with veggies. ½ of your plate should be veggies, 1/3 protein and a 1/3 good carbohydrates.
3. Avoid anything fried.
4. Limit your coffee intake. If you must drink it, drink 1 cup in the am and avoid it the rest of the day. Your body will thank you for this.
5. Avoid soda. The chemicals aren’t healthy for you and the extra sugar; sugar substitutes and calories don’t do anything to support your body either.
6. Eat every 3-4 hours to keep your blood sugar stable so you don’t get into the habit of eating too much, or too little throughout the day.
7. Make sure you are taking good quality vitamins. This is very important and at times may be confusing. For the most accurate and up to date information based on your age, health and activity level you can email me at Amy@go2beyondmotion.com to discuss this further.
8. Keep a work out log to keep yourself on track. Come up with a game plan that works with your schedule so that it includes cardio, weight/strength training and stretching each week. If you play sports, make sure you stretch each day to keep your muscles limber and prevent injuries.
9. Create a doable- enjoyable workout plan for each week. Make sure you’re working out a minimum of 3 days a week and a maximum of 6. Each week your workout should include cardio; strength training; core work and stretching. Each element is important and none is more important than the other.
10. Know that each day is a new day and that if things didn’t go exactly the way you planned yesterday, you have a fresh slate today. Being healthy for life is about creating a healthy lifestyle. Not about being perfect.